


Mercury

by Mosspool13



Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Canon Compliant, F/M, Multi, POV Nott (Critical Role)
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-02-23
Updated: 2019-08-06
Packaged: 2019-10-29 18:06:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 6
Words: 11,058
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17812853
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mosspool13/pseuds/Mosspool13
Summary: Jester put her shirt back to rights and waved to her companions. "We all have each other's names.""What?" Nott blurted. "More than one? How is that possible?"The human, Beau, huffed. "Fuck if I know."Jester twinkled. "It is because we are extra special persons and we get all of our names together! We are going to be the best of friends!"





	1. Veth

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> See end notes for trigger warnings

Veth had a name scribbled almost like chalk across the lean inside of her wrist. Four letters, a name, crisscrossed in a language she had been speaking since she was young.

Veth had been picked on by the other boys for her looks, and her habits. She liked to collect things, small trinkets and pieces of pretty stones. Harmless things, but the other halfling children found it an oddity and bullied her for it. She would curl up, after a more vicious bout of name-calling and pig-tail pulling, and just look at the inside of her wrist, staring at the name she bore and wondering if her soulmate would find her strange for collecting things too.

She hoped they would be kind.

 

She met him during one of those silly children's games. She'd been a little older, a little more nervous. She'd found alcohol to be a pleasing interlude after long bouts of bullying, taking sips from the bottle and staring forlornly at her wrist.

"Looks like I get to pick your dare." One of the boys said, his snicker wide and bold. He was one of the boys who liked to pull on her hair and call her names. One of the louder ones. His bottle had swung in the direction of a smaller halfing boy with wild curly hair and brown eyes. Veth had seen him around town a few times here and there, carrying potions and strange bright bottles. The mean boy pointed his finger at Veth and Veth shuddered when he fixed his sharp eyes on her. "I dare you to kiss her!"

Veth leant forwards, her voice strangling its way out of her throat. "Choose something else! I want my first kiss to be with my soulmate." She pleaded.

The boy stared at her, unmoved. "A dare is a dare." He shrugged. "If he chickens out, well, then that's good for you, huh?"

The boy with the curly hair looked at her; his eyes were big. "I won't if you really don't want me to." He said. His voice was very soft.

Veth looked over at the boys who were grinning like madmen. They looked pleased and they snickered and whispered to each other. "Look at poor Veth. No one will ever want to kiss her!" They said. "I bet not even her soulmate! She'll be waiting forever!"

Veth curled her arms around herself, tilting her wrist so she could see her soulmate's name, and quietly whispered an apology. She looked up at the curly-haired boy. "It's alright." She said, glancing at the snickering boys. "You seem... kind."

The boy's smile was warm and as soft as his voice. He cupped Veth's cheeks in his hand. "This will be my first too." He whispered, and pressed his lips to hers.

They say soulmate kisses are supposed to be legendary. Blinding. World-shattering.

His lips were a little chapped, and his fingers strange on her skin, and his breath a little hot and strong. It wasn't legendary, or blinding, or world-altering or even a very good kiss.

But it felt like coming home.

 

Veth married Yeza Brenatto two years and one day later. Her soulmark burned white hot on the day they consummated their marriage. It hurt, but in a good way: as though the universe were pleased.

They had Luc a few months later. His little fingers and legs were the most precious things Veth had ever seen, and she clutched him to her chest. He was her treasure. and she'd never let anything bad happen to him.

When Luc was old enough to understand, Veth told him about her soulmark and about meeting Yeza, showing her son the four letters of Yeza's name on her wrist. Their chalky outline had solidified over time as they had met and married and had Luc. Now it was proudly bold and stark against her skin. She showed him his own soulmark, a very tiny scribble of black sketching against the inside of his elbow. The name was still too small to read, but Veth was sure that her son's soulmate would be a beautiful person.

After all, Veth's had been.

 

When the goblins came for them, Veth could feel her soulmark burning almost as hot as it had on her wedding day. This was not a good burning. It was like pinpricks of constant pain that throbbed up her wrist and made her fingers stiff and sore.

They ran for what felt like hours, but the goblins never strayed or tired. Finally, Veth knew she would need to do something serious if she was to keep her family alive. She told Yeza to take Luc and run to the town, she kissed him, taking a vial of poison he'd handed her, and ran in the opposite direction, screaming at the top of her lungs.

The goblins took the bait. Chasing her until her legs felt too sore to move any further.

They surrounded her, chittering and laughing in their ugly language and Veth threw her poison at the closest goblin to her.

It was a mistake.

It had saved her life, but only for so long.

The goblins grabbed her, tore at her clothes, dragged her to the river, grinding their teeth and cackling in their mad way.

They dunked her under the water and held her while she fought them with all that she could.

For her son. For her husband. 

This was Veth's end.

But this was Nott's beginning.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> TW: for implied drowning  
> (It's very short and not described in detail, but I felt I would add it here just in case)


	2. Nott and Caleb

When Nott awoke, she was no longer herself. Her skin was green, her hair black and stringy, her eyes yellow and her teeth big and scary. She stared at herself in the river until she could no longer stand the sight of her image.

The other goblins cackled at her, told her what they had done to her, and Nott wept into the night for her loss.

But it only got worse from there.

She woke up in the middle of the night, after crying herself to sleep, to a sharp pain in her wrist. It was her soulmark.

Her soulmark was bleeding.

Her soulmark was changing.

The familiar bold outline of Yeza's name was slowly bleeding in red rivulets down her green skin and the name of her husband was slowly dripping with it. Nott cried out, clutching her blood to her wrist and pressing it back into the skin, hoping against hope she could blazon his name back into its familiar place.

But it was no use. The blood fell and Yeza's name with it. When Nott moved her hand away, her wrist was shiny and clean.

As though a word had never sat there to begin with.

 

With her new body, Nott learned new things about herself. She found that her love of collecting things had become a compulsion, and that her enjoyment of alcohol had become an obsession. Her nervousness became anxiety. And her soulmark, well, that changed too.

With Yeza's name gone from her wrist, Nott had thought the universe had taken everything from her. That she no longer belonged to her husband, to her son. That she belonged to no one.

But then, one night while she was wandering outside the goblin camp, she happened to be washing her face in the river. She usually tried to avoid her reflection as much as she could, but her eyes had glanced off the still surface of the water and had just caught the faint lines gleaming across her collarbone. Surprised, Nott had stared and then squinted at the letters, trying to read them, but the language was not one she was familiar with. She traced her finger across the caricatures, counting in her mind. One, two, three, four... five. Five letters.

 _Not Yeza_. She thought, and let her hand fall limp.

 

She was in a jail cell. The walls were stone and the room was cold. There were two cots against the wall and a latrine, but the cell was small and empty.

Until she saw a bundle of cloth move from on top of one of the cots.

Nott hissed as a shaggy head of hair looked up and turned to her. It was a man. A human, with red hair and a beard. He was covered in grime and his coat and scarf were dirty and in need of serious repair. Nott remembered the dozens of times she had to sew back together Yeza's clothes when he'd get too overzealous in his potion-making, blowing up his cauldron and once, even accidentally shearing off his eyebrows.

The man blinked at her, a set of blue eyes stared her down and Nott instinctively tried to hide her face underneath her hood.

"It is alright." He said. His voice was low and quiet, barely discernible, a nearly soundless thing. "I am no threat to you."

Nott stared at him, at the tangle of unkempt hair and sunken eyes, his face pale and listless, and she remembered the humans who had spat at her, knocked her aside, screamed bloody murder at her in the streets until the guards had come running and snatched her by the bone of her wrist, hauling her to the cells for her skin-tone, long ears and goblin features.

She thought, _no, not yet_.

The early days spent in the cell, ticking towards her eventual trial and most likely execution, was spent in relative silence. Nott was wary of her cellmate, and, at first, she thought he had no interest in her. It became clear as the days went by, and the food and drink the guards would leave him lay either untouched or barely eaten, that the human was elsewhere. His eyes were always distant, and his nightmares violent things. He would wake up screaming more times than Nott could count, and she would huddle in the corner of the cell and stare while he spoke in a language she didn't understand, calming himself down.

One night, another nightmare took a hold of him, and he thrashed in his thin gray sheet. He was sweating and panting with fear and Nott, unable to stand the pain and horror etched into each wrinkle on his face, pressed her small hand on his forehead and tried to soothe him into better dreams. It was something she had done for Luc a few times, when he was young and had caught illness and would wake from fever dreams, crying. She had sung then in her voice and rocked her baby in her arms until he fell into a more peaceful slumber. Nott's new voice was not made for singing. Too high-pitched and shrieking. She hadn't tried since she had changed but she let it out now, hoping that maybe even something about her new body could soothe this poor soul.

It seemed to work, surprisingly. The man's panting slowed and his thrashing stilled. His eyes opened slowly and he flinched. Nott flinched away too and they found themselves staring at each other, blue meeting yellow.

"You are a goblin." He said, and Nott realized, with a jolt, that her hood had come undone.

She jumped away like a skittish animal, pressing her back against the wall. "I-I'm sorry I shouldn't have touched you, I--" It was the first words she had spoken to him.

The man sat up. "It is fine. Ah," He interrupted, awkward in his halting speech. "I do not, uh, mind."

She stared at him. "You don't?" She felt her mind coming apart. "But I'm a goblin."

" _Ja_."

"You shouldn't ever trust a goblin. Do you know what they could do to you?"

"Nothing that I have not deserved." He sounded faraway again, but when she looked, he was staring at her. "You seem alright, uh, so far."

Nott stared at him. His eyes were the brightest they had been in all of the days they had spent in this cell. Only a few, but it was as though they were finally in the same room together.

"What's your name?" She asked.

He looked at her for a long moment. His face was neutral in a strange way and Nott thought for a moment that he might not want to give it.

"It is Caleb." He said, haltingly, eventually. "Widogast." He added, almost as an afterthought.

Nott stuck out her hand. "I am Nott." It was a name she had carved out of herself, staring at her reflection too long in the river. Looking at all the faults, imperfections, all the things she was not. "It's nice to meet you, Caleb."

Caleb stared at her outstretched hand for a moment and Nott realized, maybe, that he might not want to touch hands with a goblin. She started to pull her hand back but he moved before she could, reaching out to meet it. His hand and arm was wrapped tightly in bandages. "You are a strange goblin." He said.

"You are a strange human." Nott shot back, something she had not done in a long time. It felt like years since she had teased Yeza over the fireplace, the smell of mixed herbs and draughts, poisons and elixirs mixing in the air around them.

She had curbed herself amongst the goblins, hatred like a wound in her heart, fear like a brand on her skin. She watched them pillage, torture, mutilate, and was forced to join in and it curdled her stomach. Their jeers were far worse than the bullying she had endured in her childhood. She had not been a good goblin. She had not wanted to be.

 

They escaped the jail cell, eventually, together. It had become an unspoken agreement, that they would travel together, at least until the next town. And it continued, into the next town and the next. They would tell themselves, the next town, I will leave. But it never happened. They became used to each other, and comfortable in ways Nott had not been for a long time. She found herself laughing openly and admonishing Caleb on his eating habits, things she used to do to Yeza when he would forget to eat dinner some nights. Caleb still had nightmares, and Nott would curl up at his side in their room and whisper him back to better dreams at night.

It became clear that this world did not look kindly on goblins, even a goblin like Nott, who did not have the stomach for torture, nor the same malicious nature. Though she found she could not help the itch when it came, to steal trinkets from pockets of nobles or to snatch baubles off of shiny floors. Her alcoholism was also something that became more intense with time. Caleb took to her habits surprisingly easily. He helped provide her with booze when she craved it, and never admonished her for her desires. He even praised her when she managed to steal something, from the most valuable jewelry to the less exciting rocks or trinkets.

In return, Nott gave him her gold and stole him books.

Caleb was a reader, Nott learned this quickly. His fingers would twitch when he didn't have a book to hold on to. He read through books quickly, sometimes staying up late just to read. In many ways, he was like Yeza, who would miss sleep when he was too engrossed in his lab. It was an ache, to think of Yeza and her son, at home, without her, but Nott need only to look at her bare wrist to see that the universe had decided that they didn't need her anymore.

She asked Caleb about his soulmate. If he'd met them. He'd looked at her, and his eyes had gone distant like they had in that jail cell months ago. "Gone." He'd said. "Please do not ask again." He'd added, later, after he'd had a more violent nightmare than most, waking up shivering and sweating in his cot hours later at night, Nott's soothing words unable to lull him back to slumber.

It was only the once, and she had not tried again.

He was like her. She'd thought. They'd lost their soulmates together.

It was a few nights later that Nott learned about Caleb's magic.

It was a job gone wrong. Nott had only meant to steal one book, but then she'd thought, what was the harm in another? But she'd made too much noise when she'd slipped it from the shelves and the store owner had noticed and raised the alarm. Nott was fast and silent, but she could not shake the tail of the guards on her. It was like the town and the jail cell all over again. She would be captured, sentenced and executed.

But this time, she had Caleb. He had appeared then, his hand making a strange glow, his fingers rapid and bright, and fire had leapt from the tips, striking her pursuers and setting their robes aflame. They'd screamed and worked to put them out and the distraction gave Nott enough time to hide and sneak away.

"You can do magic?" She'd asked, her eyes wide and excited. He'd nodded solemnly, looking uncomfortable.

" _Ja_. I had studied, once."

"That's amazing, Caleb! You're amazing!" She'd said and she'd thought so, when she'd seen the fire fly from his hand straight and true and uncomplicated. She remembered the goblins, forcing her head under the water and their tale of the witch they had brought her to, the witch who had taken Nott's body from her. She looked at Caleb and she saw a wizard, a wizard who could one day grow and grant her a wish.

Grant her back her body.

She thought of Yeza, of Luc. She thought of her bare wrist.

They began to do cons. With Caleb's magic now a known element between them, he was more comfortable performing it around her. They came up with multiple ways to gain quick gold, in case of emergency to make a hasty retreat, and a con even to play dead. He showed her his cat Frumpkin, who Nott might have eaten... twice. But that was only because she was really hungry! Really, Caleb. It had been an accident.

Caleb taught her bits of little spells here and there: a spell to make a small illusion, a spell to summon a tiny purple hand to do your bidding, a spell to cause someone to fall incapacitated to the floor in wild laughter. A spell to change one's appearance momentarily. That one was her favorite.

In return, Nott showed him her alchemical knowledge. The knowledge she had picked up watching Yeza work at home. And she began to steal for him more important books. Magical tomes. Books on spells. Anything she thought could help him grow, learn, become stronger. So he could change her.

Eight months they traveled together, needing no one but themselves. Doing cons, scraping up as much gold as they could, hoarding it for food and booze and Caleb's sorcery, and Nott nurtured him as best she could. Her boy.

That was, until Trostenwald... and the circus.


	3. You All Meet In An Inn

It started when Nott saved Caleb's life. Their first night in Trostenwald. A con gone bad. Caleb had been struck and he had fallen unconscious, bleeding from a wound that left him pale while his blood pooled about his body. Nott shoved a healing potion down his throat and used her crossbow to kill the man who had wounded him. She felt no remorse, looking down at Caleb and praying that he would wake up, watching the breath pull from his body in choking coughs. She realized that this human was fragile. That he could die so easily, so quickly. It was like Luc, and Nott's desperate desire to keep him safe from the goblins. Looking at Caleb bleeding had her heart racing with fear.

She would not let one of her sons die.

That night, in the inn, Caleb's wound bandaged as best Nott could, Caleb had looked at her in a strange way, almost in disbelief. Like he had not believed that she would have risked her life for his. That she would have killed for him.

"You are truly Nott The Brave." He'd said.

The name had been a joke. Something she had conjured up when she was drunk and high on success. They had executed a flawless con, gathering more gold and coin then they usually managed, when Nott and a burly human man had wagered on a drinking contest. Whoever drank the most and didn't pass out won the gold. Nott had won, and Caleb had gotten a little extra coin from the spectators, who were curious about the spectacle of a tiny halfling girl (she'd disguised herself as such, of course) swallowing bottle after bottle of booze and beer. Afterwards, Nott had boasted. "I am Nott! The bravest you have ever met! Nott The Brave!" She'd slammed her glass on the tabletop. Caleb had quickly ushered them out of there before the people could realize their coin was missing. The name had been a joke because Nott was always terrified. Terrified of her new body, of the loss of her husband and her son, of her blank wrist and the new name on her collarbone that she had not looked at once since she discovered it. Terrified of losing Caleb and his magic and her desire to be changed.

She used the name when she introduced herself to the motley crew in the inn that next morning: the blue tiefling with the twinkling eyes, the scowling human girl covered in bruises, the half-orc with the smooth voice, the silent ashen woman with the big sword, the glimmerous circus man strutting like a peacock.

The blue tiefling's eyes widened and her mouth stretched into a grin full of white teeth. She was cute, in a bubbly way. "Oh my gosh, oh my gosh! I have your name on my skin!"

Nott stared. Her hand instinctively clutched the words on her collarbone.

"My name is Jester!" She said, giddy. She pointed at the gruff woman. "That's Beau." and then she motioned to the half-orc, "and he's Fjord!" She then began to undress. Nott yelped and stammered. Caleb quickly averted his eyes. The half-orc started to complain, fiercely blushing. "Jester, a little discretion please--"

"But I need to show her!" Jester had moved aside part of her shirt so that her shoulder and the top half of her chest was bare. In silky lettering, Nott could see words stretching the length of blue skin.

Nott read them aloud. "Nott the Brave." She stared. Jester began to giggle. "You're making me blush!" She said, in her thick accent, and Nott sprang back.

Jester put her shirt back to rights and waved to her companions. "We all have each other's names."

"What?" Nott blurted. "More than one? How is that possible?"

The human, Beau, huffed. "Fuck if I know."

Jester twinkled. "It is because we are extra special persons and we get all of our names together! We are going to be the best of friends!"

That was when the purple tiefling and the ashen woman showed up and advertised their circus. Jester had sprung up and taken off her shirt again to show the two of them their names etched into the scroll of her shoulder blade. Nott watched in fascination as she glimpsed a curl of letters on her sternum and the back of her neck. It was true. She did have more than one soulmate. Nott rubbed the letters on her collarbone. Was the name "Jester" written there?  

She and Caleb were still sitting adjacent to the ruckus evolving beside them and Caleb leant in close. "What do you want to do?" He asked her, eyes very serious.

"What do you mean?"

"Well, she is your soulmate, _ja_? I will not be upset if you decide to stay with her."

Nott scratched her nails across the words on her collarbone. "Maybe, but Caleb--" she turned sharply to face him and took his hand into hers. Caleb did not flinch away, like he used to do when they had first decided to partner up. He let her take his hand into both of hers. "You will always be my first choice. Okay? Soulmate or no soulmate."

Because if Nott was going to get her body back, and her soulmate and son, she would need Caleb's help. And she'd help Caleb too. She knew he needed it, after all, those nightmares had to come from somewhere. Even if she didn't know what he needed or why, she'd help him and he'd help her.

 

Mollymauk Tealeaf, the purple tiefling, was quite delighted to have found his soulmates too. He showed off his tattoos and inscribed in each was the name of his soulmate: all of their names, in fact. Nott could see hers, quite clearly, as a part of one of his tattoos: on the tip of a peacock feather. Even Caleb's name was a tiny swatch of Zemnian circling Molly's bicep. Caleb had been wide-eyed when Molly'd graced them with each name, pointing them out when each of them had introduced themselves. Jester showed Caleb his name too, which was the piece of lettering Nott had seen on the back of Jester's neck. Beau, reluctantly, had unwound some of the wrappings across her knuckles to show off each of their names lining the tops of her fingers. Fjord had flushed when Jester had asked him to show his and stated, quite firmly. "They're in a place that's not... decent for polite company." And hadn't elaborated when Jester and Molly had needled him further. Yasha, when prompted by her companion, had eventually showed a line of names scrawling across her spine.

"So! What about you guys?" Jester had asked, after the others had shown off, or not shown, in Fjord's case, their names.

Nott, who had been covering the name on her collarbone for the entirety of the conversation, slowly took her hand off. "This is the only one I have."

Jester had blinked. "Oh. Can I see?" Nott nodded and Jester came up close and peered down at her.   

"I can't read it." She said, stepping back. "I'm sorry, Nott."

Nott's heart slowed, as if it had been speeding up with anticipation, and she felt disappointed, which surprised her. She hadn't thought that she cared about the name on her skin, not after losing Yeza. "It's okay." She told Jester, smiling up at her. "I can't read it either."

Jester frowned. "That really sucks! You can't read who it is! How are you supposed to find them then?" She pouted. "Don't worry, Nott, I'll talk to the guy who writes our names on us and see if he can fix it for you!"  

Molly raised an eyebrow at her, "You know the guy who writes these?"

Jester nodded, beaming. "Of course! Leave it to me."

Caleb and Nott exchanged a skeptical look. Fjord pinched the bridge of his nose while Beau rolled her eyes. It seemed no one else really bought into it either.

Then, Jester started talking about the circus, and Molly had given them the pamphlets, and Nott had convinced Caleb to go with her.

"After the circus, we'll leave." Nott whispered to Caleb.

He looked at her. "You do not want to stay with your soulmates?"

Nott pointed to her collarbone, to the words that meant nothing. "I don't have any of their names on my skin. Just this. It doesn't meant much of anything. Besides." She took Caleb's hand. "Words or no words, we're a team, okay, Caleb?"

Caleb relaxed. Nott realized he'd been tense the entire time. " _Ja._ Okay."   

 

Standing over Caleb's crumpled form, health potion still dribbling down the corner of his mouth, Nott stared at the dead demon toad and looked around at her companions. Fjord's sword was a gleaming, foaming golden thing that he banished with a wave of his hand. Jester was hopping up and down, talking excitedly about their success. Molly was speaking soothing words into Toya's ear while Beau stood over her, arms crossed and frowning. They were all crazy, but, they had beaten a demon toad together. That was more than Nott could say for herself, even the time she spent with Caleb hadn't ended in such fruitful pursuits. They had done merely simple cons, stealing bits of things here and there.

They had actually defeated a demon!

Jester ran up to Nott's side, looking down at Caleb who was blinking owlishly back at them. "Oh Caleb! You look really bad! Here, let me!" She knelt down and whispered some words and then Nott watched as his wounds began to heal and close up.

Jester sprang up. "There! All better!" She skipped away to Molly's side, where they were letting the little girl Toya lean on his shoulder.

Caleb slowly got to his feet, Nott helping him up. "Well... at the very least, the blue one is useful for healing." He said, still looking a bit pale from blood loss.

"But we killed a demon, Caleb! That's amazing!"

" _Ja._ I suppose."

If more people were around to help Nott keep Caleb alive, well, she couldn't complain.

Maybe they could entertain this whole soulmate thing after all.


	4. The Mighty Nein

Jester, one night, pulled Nott aside and whispered. "So, I have this secret."

It had been several days since the circus incident, and their first foray into detective work. Nott had become quite comfortable with Jester's antics, Jester's smiles, Jester's... well, everything. Excluding Caleb, Nott liked Jester the best.

"So you know about my best friend, The Traveler. The best and coolest guy out there?" Jester began. Nott didn't know if The Traveler was real or not, or how special he was, but Jester seemed enamored and, well, she could be persuasive. "He's the one who writes them, you know."

"Writes what?"

"The names!" Jester loudly whispered which wasn't really a whisper at all. "On our bodies. He travels around the world and writes down who is tied to who onto us so that we know who our soulmates are!"

"Really?" Nott's fingers ghosted over her words. "That's... kind of impressive."

"Isn't it?"

"Are you... sure though?" Nott asked, tentatively. She never really knew where to poke and prod when it came to Jester's god.

"Pretty sure. He told me so!" Jester replied, bright and happy as ever. "SO, I talked to him about your words and why they don't mean anything, and you know what he said? He said that they just don't mean anything yet! So what I was thinking was that your soulmate maybe isn't born yet, you know, and that when they are, your words will make sense!"

"That... makes a lot of sense." Nott admitted, intrigued. Jester beamed back at her. "I know, right?"

 

It came up as a question later, why Nott didn't have anyone else's names on her skin.

"Maybe it's a one-sided thing." Fjord had said, rubbing his hip as if he were soothing an old bruise.

"Maybe we just have to earn our names." Beau had said, rather insightfully.

Nott hadn't known what to say about it, but her hand reached for Caleb's across the fire and squeezed, "Soulmate or no soulmate, we're in this together." She whispered and Caleb squeezed back.

 

In Alfield, the gnolls put up a good fight. Nott was still a bit singed from her escapade into the burning building. It was unfortunate that some of them managed to escape with those stolen goods, but as long as Caleb was alive, Nott didn't mind so much.

Even if those shiny things that had been in the cart had looked pretty cool.

The officer, Bryce, seemed relieved to have gained the assistance. They thanked Nott and the others profusely. "What can I do to repay you?" They said.

"Gold. Gold is good." Jester said, grinning.

"And a bed for the night." Fjord added.

"And some food. I'm fucking starving." Beau insisted.

"Ah, we have... one inn that has not yet burnt down," they chuckled weakly. "I am sure they can accommodate you for the night. Or for how long you wish to stay."  

They got three rooms, Caleb and Nott sharing one, and Nott curled up at the foot of Caleb's bed, yawning.

"Your skin is... still burnt." Caleb said, after a little while of silence.

"Oh, yeah, I forgot to get Jester to heal me. It's okay, Caleb, it was only a little bit. It doesn't hurt anymore."

There was more silence, and then the shuffling of blankets as Caleb moved in the cot to rub Nott's head gently. "...If you are sure."

 

Later, with Caleb nearly catatonic after the manticore had burst into flames, Nott realized that Caleb's issues ran far deeper than simple nightmares.

Molly was gently talking Caleb down, trying to reach him, and Nott appeared at his elbow as soon as she was sure the manticore was dead.

"Caleb?" She whispered. "It's me, Nott. Can you hear me?"

Caleb gave her a shaky nod, his eyes were still glassy and faraway, like they had been in the jail cell several months ago.

She lifted her fingers, showing him three, "how many fingers am I holding up?"

" _Drei_." He said.

"Uh." Nott let her hand fall. "I'm going to pretend you said three."

"I did." He murmured. And Molly grinned toothily beside Caleb. "He's okay now." He said, matter-a-fact, clapping Caleb on the shoulder and moving away. Caleb moved with the blow and then winced, staring down at Nott blearily.

"Are you okay... really?" Nott whispered, taking Caleb's hand.

He didn't respond for a moment before he nodded, slowly.  

Nott, when Caleb had eventually convinced her he was fine, for the moment, wandered over to Beau. Beau was leaning against the wall of the cavern, reattaching the wraps on her hands. "Thank you Beau... for saving me." Nott said.

Beau shrugged. "Yeah, well, what are soulmates for."

Nott startled, "Oh." She thought of Yeza and his warmth and the kindness in his eyes. The way he said the name that was once hers, with laughter in his voice. She thought of Luc and his tiny hands and toes, and the tiny letters of his own soulmate that had only just started to take form.

She thought of having lost them, how she would never know what Luc's soulmate's name was. 

She thought of her bare wrist and the words on her collarbone that said nothing. 

And she thought of Beau, and the backs of her fingers, and the calligraphy dotting Jester's skin, and Fjord's hidden words that he still blushed about, and Molly's tribute of tattoos, and Yasha's line on her back, and Caleb's surprise when the others showed him his name on their bodies.

What are soulmates for?

 

Back in Alfield, Bryce asked them for the name they went by. They all looked at each other. They hadn't really thought about calling each other anything. Their relationship together was mostly impermanent. There was always the sense that, eventually, they would part ways, despite the names written on their skin. At least, in Nott's eyes. Maybe it was _because_ Nott didn't have their names on her skin that made her think that the group was not likely to continue on together. Aside from Caleb, Nott liked them all well enough but she had her own goals: and that was to make Caleb stronger. Then, when Caleb had what he needed, Nott could get her body back and return to her husband and son.

"The Mighty Nein." a thick Zemnian accent spoke up, and everyone looked at Caleb. His shoulders were stalwart and he looked faintly amused but also fairly serious. "That's what we are called."

It was as the last bit of his sentence finished, the bite of the consonant leaving his teeth, when Nott felt a white-hot pain burst open from her neck. She cried out and heard the others make similar sounds of distress. Caleb clutched Nott's shoulder, hissing in Zemnian and asking her if she was okay. He was upright and seemed fine except for the obvious concern in his brow, and Nott curled closer as if she could escape the pain by burrowing into Caleb's side.

"Gods above, fuck." Beau cursed, and sweared even more fiercely as she clutched her hand tight, grinding her teeth.

Jester was curled up in a ball on the floor, whimpering, and Fjord was bent on his knees, hands around his stomach. Molly was clawing feverishly at his clothes, eyes wild with fear and pain.

Somewhere, Yasha was hunched over, roaring out as she too felt the same inexplicable pain lancing down her spine.

Bryce was hovering, looking horrified and confused, unsure what to do. They had only asked for their name!

Then, the pain stopped. Abruptly. Suddenly. As if it hadn't been there to begin with at all. Nott was sweating and huffing out breath. Her voice was hoarse from screaming.

"Nott? Nott!" Caleb said, shaking her slightly. "Breathe." Nott did as he asked, wheezing and gasping, trying to collect herself. 

"What the fuck." Beau spat, having collected herself. She started yanking at her wraps and tearing them away in her fury. "What the actual fuck!" She stared down at her hand and then froze, eyes widening in disbelief. "What the fuck." She whispered.  

"What? What is it?" Nott asked, holding herself gingerly.

"My names are gone." She said. "They were on my fingers like they usually were and now they're gone and look what I have instead." She raised her hand, showing them all the back of it, and written across the dark tone of her skin was the words: _The Mighty Nein_ , clear and precise, bold.

"Did your names... change?" Molly blurted, and then he started suddenly yanking at his clothes.

"Uh!" Bryce blinked and then quickly held a hand in front of their face to cover their eyes. "Please don't."

"It'll only be a moment, I just have to make sure... aha!" Molly exclaimed, teeth white as he grinned and showed off his new soulmate words. _The Mighty Nein_ was written quite proudly across his left pectoral.

Jester, who was shivering, slowly sat up, pressing a hand to her mouth. She waved away Fjord, who leaned over her in concern, before she sat up fully and began to hurriedly undress too. She pulled her shirt and cloak aside, showing off her shiny new words stitching her belly, just skirting her belly button. She looked up, eyes wide and shining. "It's beautiful." She said. She turned sharply to Fjord. "Fjord! Fjord! And you?" 

He flushed and crossed his arms in a protective manner. "I'll check in private." 

Jester pouted but then turned to Nott and Caleb. "Nott? Caleb?"  

Nott watched their eager faces and felt her own heartbeat begin to beat a little bit faster in anticipation. She removed her hand, which had cupped her throat, and glanced down. It was hard to see, but Nott was sure that she could make out the curl of a letter. 

Jester gasped and smiled wide and big and jumped Nott, wrapping her up in a hug. "It says it! Your words say it!" She exclaimed and Nott felt relief so profound it made her wrap her arms around Jester. 

Jester eventually put her down and all eyes went to Caleb. He had been quiet watching, listening, and now Nott could see the solemnness of his eyes. Caleb was silent for a long moment, eyes flashing to each member of the Nein before he looked down, his hair covering his eyes. "I... did not experience such a reaction." He shook his head. 

Nott reached out her hand and took his. He was faintly trembling. "It's okay, Caleb. Together, no matter what, remember?" 

He didn't say anything for a long moment, and Nott was afraid he might pull away from her, but eventually, she felt him squeeze her hand and mutter, "soulmate or no soulmate." and she beamed up at him, proud once more. 

Bryce was still standing there with them, staring at them all. Their eyes were wide with confusion and faint awe. "You are a very strange motley of individuals." They said, looking to each of them with a faint cock to their head. 

"We are just a collection of assholes." Caleb said, standing up and drawing Nott closer against his side. "And soulmates, too. The universe is funny that way."  

 


	5. Zadash

Zadash was... big. Bigger than Nott was used to. She'd spent her entire life in Felderwin, and then a few years in a goblin camp, and then the jail cell, and then on the road with Caleb through small towns. Even Alfield and Trostenwald were not big cities, not like this. Nothing like this.

She made sure her mask was secure across her face and her hood carefully placed over her ears. Caleb gave her a once over before they'd entered the city, pulling on her clothes and putting her hair to rights. They'd disguised her as Caleb's daughter when entering, but the effect of the spell had long worn off, and milling about the city layered to the gills in magic constantly was too much of a drain on both Nott and Caleb. She wished she had Fjord's Mask of Many Faces; that'd make this all more simple.

But, the joy and wonder on Molly and Jester's faces made the throngs of people side-eyeing her entirely worth it.  

And then of course, the delight of Pumat Sol was an entirely different excitement.

At first, having Caleb sparkly clean and bewildered had horrified Nott, but the deep, soulful voice and lackadaisical attitude lulled her into deciding that she liked him. It didn't hurt that she could get an endless flask out of the deal.

His several doppelgangers were genial and helpful, and Nott, curious, asked one of them, "so, if you have so many copies of yourself do they each have their own soulmate?"

The Pumats went quiet. Fjord began to admonish her, "Nott you can't just--" when one of them cut him off with a deep, bellied laugh.

"You are very cute." The Pumat said, patting Nott's head and ruffling her hair. Nott allowed it. "But no, we do not each have our own soulmates."

Another one finished, "We just have the one." 

The one touching Nott's head let her go and gently turned his inner arm to her eye. His arm was covered in fur, but he pushed aside the hair to show Nott the skin, and Nott's eyes widened upon finding the name buried there.

"You're each other's soulmates?" Nott exclaimed.

The third Pumat nodded, smiling serenely. "Yeah, we're only copies of Prime, but his name is us, and we are his." He shrugged. "It makes a bit of sense, don't it?"

"A funny lick of sense." Fjord agreed.

"That's amazing! Hey, hey, guys," Jester hopped up and down, "do you think my duplicate has our name on it too? Or maybe it has its own soulmate too? Or maybe it has _my_ name?! Wouldn't that be really cool?"   

 

Finding Yasha in the bathhouse was a delightful surprise, and a huge coincidence, but as soon as Yasha turned her back they could see that her line of names had transformed into a single strand of familiar words:  _The Mighty Nein_ across the length of her spine. It didn't seem like much of a coincidence after that. 

Nott reluctantly allowed Jester to wash her hair while she sat half-in, half-out of the water. Caleb was nearly completely submerged on her one side while she sat in Jester's lap with Fjord on the other, knees high and cheeks flushed from embarassment. Jester was giggling and poking him in the shoulder while her other hand massaged Nott's scalp and Nott sighed into it. 

They'd finally gotten to see Fjord's words, a flash of a name across the inside of his thigh. He'd been spluttering and telling them off for peeking, yelling at Molly and Jester who had both given him shit-eating grins. Nott, who had disguised herself as Fjord earlier, had serendipitously taken a look for his words, and found them moments before. She'd whispered where they were to Caleb, who'd looked at her in amusement, before they'd gone to the bathhouse.

The water was warm, and despite Nott's aversion, she felt herself calming in Jester's capable hands. She hadn't told anyone, not even Caleb, about what had happened to her. That she had drowned. It had been something from her life... the life that had been taken from her, and with this new name on her collarbone and the soulmates it had given her, she didn't know if she wanted them to know. Maybe Caleb, eventually. When she was ready to tell.

She felt herself dozing off to the lulling tone of chatter: Jester's familiar voice lilting beside her ear and the soft low tones of Fjord on her side, and Caleb's occasional comment, quiet but there; Beau's biting commentary, Yasha's monosyllables, and Molly's eccentric explosions of laughter and cheek.    

*** 

The air is hot; it feels molten, but Nott knows that it's only maybe above average in here. Yeza is holding a pot of silvery liquid. Nott remembers this, remembers the hot slickness of the metal in the pot and the sweat on her brow, and her hair tangled and wet.

Yeza is talking to her. She knows he was teaching her about the properties of metals, about his alchemy, but his words are lost to the haze of the moment, to the sweat on her skin and the heat building around her.

"Mercury." A word reaches her and Nott looks up and suddenly Yeza's smile and voice are clear as a bell. "In its liquid form we call it quicksilver. Reminds me of you."

"Me?" Nott hears herself say, but her mouth doesn't move.

Yeza's smile widens. "Yeah, you're the most solid person I know, strong, and kind, but when you need to be, you're quicksilver too. Fast, and slippery like an eel."

"I'm like an eel?" Nott heard her voice yell.

Yeza blushed and avoided a hand that Nott had thrown to pummel him. He was laughing. "It's because you run so fast!"

"You only know that because I always catch you when you run away from me!" And thus proceeded another chase between Nott and her husband. Of course, Nott caught him, she was indeed leagues faster than he was, her husband, her love, her soulmate. He was so smart, so good, but he had not a single athletic bone in his body.

 _This is a good dream_ , Nott thought.

***

Weird shenanigans in the hospital aside, they hadn't been killed! In that regard, they had done well, despite the extreme lack of productivity that had occurred. Really. What had they been thinking?

"Well, we didn't get caught and arrested." Molly pointed out afterwards, still wiping off the gross concoction that he'd applied to his dick. "So it could have ended incredibly more poorly than it had. In fact, I think we got off rather well!"

Nott pointedly looked down at his crotch, which was, thankfully, covered by his pants. He had his hand plunged deep and he was groping about down there, wincing every now and again as he cleaned himself up.    

"I can't believe we're soulmates." Fjord muttered, hand over his eyes and cheeks flushed crimson. He'd looked exhausted and embarrassed the moment they'd found safety.

Molly grinned and winked. "I'm a delight."

Nott side-eyed them as they bickered and made her way over to Caleb's side. He'd been mostly quiet since their hasty escape.

"Are you okay, Caleb?" Nott asked. He nodded, eyes moving back and forth as he watched the crowd of people around them milling about their everyday lives. Nott's eyes picked up on their jewelry and bangles, their buttons and pretty clothing, and her heart skipped faster at the thought of slipping her hand into a pocket or a coat, slipping away with a trinket. It would be as easy as breathing.

"What are we doing here?" Caleb whispered. His voice was flat and uncomfortable. Nott's eyes immediately went from the silver filigree on a passing man's coat and over to Caleb's face. "This place, these people, this... company." He paused. His expression was hard to read. "What could they possibly do for us?"

"Do you want to leave?" Nott asked. Caleb glanced at her, and then up at Molly and Fjord. Molly who was laughing and teasing, and Fjord who was standing with his arms crossed and his expression mutinous with disapproval.

He watched them for a long moment, and Nott watched them too, watched when Molly's rowdiness became too much for Fjord to handle, watched as Molly picked and prodded at him in just the ways he knew how to rile Fjord up, watched when Beau and Jester arrived, their own tale of success aglow in their eyes as they explained what they had discovered. Watched this group of soulmates interact with one another from the outside, and Nott felt a yearning in her chest, to be with them, at their side--the name on her collarbone buzzing with suppressed energy. Like it wanted to jump right off of her skin. But her love for Caleb kept her rooted to his side, because if Caleb said "yes" then she would be with him every step of the way.

"No." He finally said, his eyes still on them and Nott watched Caleb and the solemnness of his face, the way he blinked and turned back to her as if forcing himself to look away. "Not yet."

***

She should have known.

With Fjord's falchion nearly touching the soft skin of Caleb's throat, Nott's crossbow a steely grip in her hand and a glowing palm holding her at bay. She should have _fucking_ known.   

This was her punishment. The name on her skin wasn't meant to be anything else. She'd lost Yeza, and _The Mighty Nein_ was just wishful thinking.

Soulmates? It didn't matter if they were or they weren't, because trust would outbid all of that. And Nott only trusted Caleb. This was just the proof.

Caleb had the scroll in his hand, and Fjord's gaze was unrelenting. Nott wasn't surprised it had been Fjord who would turn on them first. She'd trusted him the least, even more than Yasha, who was rarely at their side but who was still so intimidating, and more than Molly who was shifty, sometimes too shifty. It was that mask of his, the one that changed his face and voice, who could trust an always changing surface?

Nott had never liked looking at reflections.

"I need this." Caleb pleaded, and Nott bared her teeth at Fjord.       

"We're supposed to stick to the plan." Fjord said, expression closed off. "Get in, get what we came for, get out, with no evidence left behind. This? This is a gonna leave a big red trail followin' right up to us."  

Caleb's mouth was pursed, his eyes wild as they darted to the scroll, to the window, to the door Fjord was blocking, trying to find an escape. Nott kept her eyes on Fjord, watching for even a single twitch. Caleb's hands tightened around the scroll, his expression fierce with desperation.

"This is... you do not understand--"

"You're right, I don't. You keep to yourself so much, Caleb, it's hard to." Fjord said, eyeing him. "We're soulmates, you're one of us, s'that means we gotta look out for each other--"

"I am not one of yours." Caleb bit out, sharp. His accent was thick and Fjord stared at him and Nott flinched too, surprised by the vehemence in his voice. When she looked at him, his eyes were distant, as if he wasn't really seeing them at all.

Fjord opened his mouth to say something, but then they heard the sounds of a scuffle and the high-pitched exclamation of Jester's surprise.

Caleb hissed out a " _Scheiße_ " before he threw the scroll onto the table and stormed his way through Fjord and out the doorway. Fjord blinked and then followed at his heels. Nott glanced once at the door, then at the scroll on the table. She paused only a moment before she had it tightly in her fist.

"We're in this together." She whispered, right as the house exploded.


	6. Revelations

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Apologies on the lateness of this chapter! I had to rewatch bits of the episodes to get the timeline correct before I could jump in and write this!

Shit hits the fan almost immediately.

They're running for their lives, trying to discreetly but quickly slip undetected into the tunnels below to escape the chaos above.

Fjord is carrying Caleb, who is mostly conscious now, half-bridal style and half over his shoulder. He seems to be straining under the weight, even though Caleb is so thin and Nott knows he doesn't weight nearly as much as he should. Nott is still glaring at Fjord, but she knows if Fjord can barely carry Caleb, then she has no hope of being able to.

Still, she'd feel safer if, say, Yasha were carrying him, but she'd vanished earlier that morning during the storm. As quick to flit in and out of their lives as the storm clouds in the sky. She had never spoken much about how she felt about soulmates and everything in between, but Nott has a feeling that her sporadic arrivals and departures have something to do with her reluctance to stay with them.

Nott doesn't have much time to think about it, because Molly shouts a warning and the group finds themselves squaring off against a black-clad suspicious individual with a glowing object in his hands.

Things get... a bit weird after that. They try to reason with the guy, then they fight, then the guards come and take the orb away with them, and then Nott finds herself making an illusion of the thing slowly rising into the air while a shocked and horrified crowd watches on.

It's hilarious.

Eventually, Caleb appears around the corner, covering the glowing orb with his coat, and eyes looking shifty under his guard-disguise. Nott ushers him into an alcove where Jester and Beau meet them and they shove it into Jester's pink knapsack for the time being.

Caleb's cheeks are flushed and Nott can see that his eyes are filled with a strange sort of excitement. Jester and Beau high-five just as Molly and Fjord finally appear, still looking flabbergasted by the whole endeavor.

"We just stole a strange, glowing object from a procession of guards... after a group of drow stole it from the city, and during the process they destroyed a _tower_ , and yet _we_ didn't get caught..." Molly pressed a hand against his forehead dramatically. "What the fuck."

"You gonna rat us out, soulmate?" Beau said, staring down Molly and crossing her arms over her chest.

Molly presses his hand to his breast. "I would never, _soulmate_." And Beau growls at him in warning for his tone. For soulmates, those two really didn't get along.

"Good. Because what it says on my hand screams accomplice." They bicker a little longer for a moment.

"'Forced to be accomplices', huh?" Fjord mutters and Nott glares at him from the side. He notices and raises his hand placatingly. "I didn't say I minded."  

Nott mimes the "I'm watching you" sign, narrowing her eyes when Fjord only smirks at her. She really doesn't like him.

It doesn't help that he and Molly forced her to spill some of her secrets to them, unwillingly, after she'd gotten caught rifling through his things for that Soltryce Academy letter of his. She was still a bit sour about that, and more sour about the spell Molly had cast.

"We should get out of this alley." Caleb suggests, coming up to stand beside Nott and placing his hand on her shoulder. It trembles ever so slightly. Nott takes it and squeezes.

***

Caleb is downstairs and the others are crowding her, crowding her, _crowding her_. 

"I mean, your relationship with Caleb is a little..." Jester makes a wiggling motion with her fingers and a more suggestive motion with her eyebrows.

"God, Jester." Fjord says, a flush of embarrassment crawling up his neck.

"Well she's not wrong, exactly." Molly says, grinning, teeth flashing with amusement. He nudges Fjord's elbow, tail curling around Fjord's wrist and Fjord tries to shake him off. He only laughs and continues, "Soulmates aren't always romantic, you know. Like me and Yasha."

"Or friendly." Beau says, shooting Molly a glare. Molly flips her two fingers.

"But it means somethin'." Fjord insists, turning his eyes on Nott. "It has to, or his name wouldn't have been on our--"

"But Caleb doesn't have names, remember?" Beau points out, saying what they'd all been thinking since their names became _The Mighty Nein_ , since the bathhouse, when they'd seen Caleb's pale skin naked of anything. "So does it matter?" 

"Is he like your dad or older brother, or--" Molly asks, ignoring Beau, tilting his chin curiously at Nott.

Nott bares her teeth, frustrated with their lack of understanding and most of all with these stupid questions. " _I_ am the parent." She emphasizes, watching the shock building on their faces. She points to the single name representing all of them on her skin. "And _this_ , this doesn't mean _shit_." She raises her chin. "His name doesn't need to be on my body, _or on his_ , to know we're connected, or that it has to mean something."

"He's my boy." Nott continues, threatens really, because at the end of the day, she will choose Caleb over the lot of them, even Jester, who she is fond of. _In a heartbeat._

(Caleb over Luc, though, that's a different question for another time, a time when a chair in an upturned apothecary sits between her and her family, her second family, when she can call them that and mean it with all her heart.)     

"So... you're the mom, then." Molly says, after a long, long silence.

Nott hisses at him.

"The point is." Beau says, shoving Molly hard in the shoulder. He makes a dramatic wounded noise, rubbing his shoulder and grinning. "Can we trust him. Trust _you_?"

"Well of course we can, Beau!" Jester says, lively and honest and so, so bright. "They're our soulmates!" She smiles wide and innocent. "We're The Mighty Nein!" And she proudly touches the spot where their names are.

No one refutes her, how could they? This is Jester. But the look of suspicion in Beau's eyes remains, and Molly's face is grinning but it doesn't reach his eyes, and Fjord's face is blank, wearing another mask, and Nott knows she's holding a lot back. They may all be soulmates, but there's a wall built between them.

***

And then, not even a few hours later, they find out Molly is Lucien is Nonagon, or whatever the fuck, and surrounded in a Truth Spell where Molly shakes his head and says, "I'm Mollymauk Tealeaf, fuck the other guy," it suddenly makes sense why Molly's name had been tattooed on their body and not the others. A new person, a new life, a completely different soul--and Nott clutches her wrist where Yeza's name sat and wonders if she too was completely remade--if Veth even exists anymore.  

***

Nott is still soaked when they make it to that weird place for The Gentleman. She's trembling, thinking about drowning, and so she boasts, hides her discomfort and strides confidently into the dungeon. 

She misses a bunch of traps and nearly gets Yasha seriously hurt. 

"This one is on me." She tells them, taking the blame. The others don't seem too bothered, aside from Beau hiding a wound in her chest and Yasha picking bolts out of her arm. 

Then they fight some will-o-wisps and then Nott saves Fjord's life. 

He gives her a look, when he's safely back out of the hole, something a little confused, a little grateful, a little impressed with her, and Nott hisses at him, "this doesn't make up for what happened." and he nods, accepts it, but doesn't say he's sorry. She narrows her eyes at his back. 

Then, they fight a fucking massive cube that swallows up Frumpkin and which Caleb reveals a new spell. Nott is so delighted to see him using stronger and stronger magic. She knows he's close, that he will one day be able to do what she wants him to do for her. That he could fix this, fix her, fix her words, bring it all back to normal. That's what she wants: she wants it to all go back to normal. 

***

Fjord files his tusks which is... horrifying. Nott stares at him and the way he picks his teeth and wants to grab his wrist and shove it to the floor. It's too similar to how she feels, in this body, the feeling she can see in his eyes, hear in his words. She hates the fact that she finds herself empathizing with him considering he pointed a sword at Caleb's throat and a glowing hand at Nott's. Molly makes a crude joke that has Fjord spluttering as Jester waxes on about his good looks. Nott finds herself agreeing with her, despite her inner turmoil. 

It's too much, knowing this much about these people. Fjord's image issues, Jester's mother, Molly's names (and not the ones on his skin), Yasha's heritage, Beau's... well... she doesn't know a lot about Beau yet. Either way, this is what she is signed up for, hadn't signed up for it at all, having these people be connected to her through fate's choice. 

She wants Yeza, and Luc, and Caleb too, so he can change her back to the way she was. (She loves him, but she hasn't admitted it to herself yet. It will take hearing about his past to make her realize it for the first time. That she does care about him beyond his magic. But that's for another time).  

She doesn't want six soulmates, she just wants the one, and her son.  

***

She's sitting by the bar, wearing a dress that has buttons up and down the sleeve. Her disguise isn't perfect, she was too afraid to do the real thing, but she's got the braids, the right skin tone, the right nose, the right eyebrows. It's as close as she will allow herself to be, today. 

"You want something?" The bartender asks her and she waves him away. For once, she doesn't have the desire to drink. Instead, she watches the patron of the bar, bustle and chatter and laugh, and she looks at the inside of her wrist where Yeza's name blinks back at her. 

 _Back to normal,_ she thinks. Not quite yet, but soon. 

*** 

Later, in the privacy of their room, Caleb's hands holding the dodecahedron and Jester leaning over his shoulder, Nott watches Caleb's expression go slack in ways it doesn't during his sleep.

Jester touches Caleb's shoulder but he doesn't react. "Do you think he is seeing the entire universe?" Jester jokes, but she looks concerned and Nott feels her pulse skitter with the beginnings of fear.

"Caleb?"

He doesn't respond, and before Nott can grab him and shake him, a light escapes the dodecahedron, flies up into the air to Nott and Jester's confusion, and disappears into Caleb's chest. Caleb blinks and his expression clears and he looks at them. "What?" He says, to their blank expressions.

Nott clutches Caleb's elbow, hard. He winces but doesn't try to pull away, just looks more confused. Jester pokes Caleb in the chest, where the light disappeared and when he leans away from her warily she does it again. "Ow. Jester, please."

"I'm trying to see where the light thingy went. You just swallowed it up into your chest!" She poked him a third time and Caleb moved away from her. Jester looked up at him; her eyes were a little worried. "What did you see?"

Caleb began to explain what the dodecahedron did, to Nott and Jester's fascination. Jester tried to use it too, but the device wouldn't work and she pouted, and Caleb suggested that perhaps they could try again later.

"How do you feel?" Nott asked, after Jester had left the room and they were alone again. Caleb rubbed his chest where the light had entered him. 

"Lucky." He said. His expression was somewhat vacant, looking into the distance as he continued, haltingly, "It was like... threads of different paths... I could see them all. Connections." He tried to explain further. "Almost like different choices that could lead me down a different course of life."

Nott sat up. "Like... fate?" She swiped at the underside of her wrist with her thumb. "Like... our words?"

Caleb shrugged and looked down. "I cannot be sure."

"Do you think... that this could... influence our words, that maybe... we could change them?" _C_ _hange mine back_ , she didn't say.

Caleb looked up then, something surprised and a little curious about his face. "Nott--do you?" He paused and then swallowed, pressing his arms close to his chest in a vulnerable pose. " _Tut mir Leid_ , I should not ask, you have not asked about mine," he winces.

"No, Caleb, it's fine it's just--" She fiddles with her wrist, swiping at the skin a second time intently, as though she can will Yeza's name into existence there. "Do you think this could help you? Get what you want?" 

Caleb doesn't say anything for a long moment. He doesn't look at her for a long moment, eyes tracing the lines on his skin, the nicks in his fingers and the bumps in his hand. His bandages are wrapped securely about his wrist, forearm and fingers, smudged and dirty. Nott has never once seen him take them off. 

Finally, he looks up, and gestures for Nott's hand. She gives it to him, watches as he turns her hand over, inspects her skin. When his finger brushes against the inside of her wrist, she shivers. If her words had been there, she would have felt something, the flutter of her pulse or the sharp twinge of her heart. Instead she shivers because she feels nothing at all. 

"I think it could be a start." Caleb says, letting her go, and Nott clutches her hand to the safety of her breast. 

"Okay." She nods. "Okay."  


End file.
